Gyeonggi-do Special Judicial Police Crack Down on 10 Illegal Dessert Manufacturers and Sellers Including Macarons

[Asia Economy (Suwon) = Reporter Lee Young-gyu] Gyeonggi Province has uncovered a large number of unscrupulous operators who stored expired chocolate without labeling it for educational or disposal purposes, or who produced dessert products without proper quality inspections for nearly two years.

The Gyeonggi Province Special Judicial Police announced on the 16th that from April 23 to 29, they conducted crackdowns on dessert manufacturing and sales businesses such as macarons, cookies, and cakes in five areas including Ansan, Siheung, Gwangmyeong, Pyeongtaek, and Anseong, and found 10 companies violating the Food Sanitation Act. The province plans to file criminal charges against all the caught companies and request administrative actions such as business suspension from the respective cities and counties.

In violation cases, Company A located in Ansan was caught storing cake chocolate that was 2 years and 4 months past its expiration date without labeling it for educational or disposal purposes.

Company B in Ansan, which manufactures and sells bakery products, was caught conducting self-quality inspections by an accredited testing institution only twice from July 2018 to April this year, and not conducting any other inspections.

According to the Food Sanitation Act, storing products or raw materials past their expiration date for food manufacturing purposes or without labeling for educational or disposal use, or failing to conduct self-quality inspections, is punishable by up to 3 years imprisonment or a fine of up to 30 million won. For bakery manufacturing in food processing industries, self-quality inspections must be conducted once every two months through an accredited testing institution in accordance with the Food Sanitation Act and related laws.

Inchi Kwon, head of the province’s Special Judicial Police, emphasized, "Since desserts are widely distributed in the recent dining-out market, hygiene management is especially important," and added, "We will continuously crack down to ensure safe dessert distribution and strictly punish illegal activities according to relevant regulations."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.